logo
episode-header-image
Nov 2023
11m 25s

The Flying Artilleryman

The Retrospectors
About this episode
Dropping bombs from planes was unheard of until 1st November 1911, when Italian Lieutenant Giulio Gavotti embarked on an aerial mission over Libya. With a handful of lightweight grenades resting in his lap, he headed to Ain Zara, a village near Tripoli, and chucked them overboard. This audacious act occurred only eight years after the Wright brothers' initia ... Show More
Up next
Yesterday
Ricky Martin's Latin Explosion
Ricky Martin’s ‘Livin’ La Vida Loca’ was released on 23rd March, 1999 - launching the singer to worldwide superstardom, and kickstarting a Latino pop boom that propelled J-Lo, Shakira, Christina Aguilera, Enrique Iglesias and Santana into the charts. But he wasn’t an overnight su ... Show More
11m 4s
Mar 20
What Caused The Black Death?
The bubonic plague was blamed on witches, Jews, God’s wrath, and, on 20th March 1345, in a new theory propagated by the King of France, the rare planetary alignment between Saturn, Jupiter, and Mars in Aquarius. Of course, the real cause of the Black Death lay in the microscopic ... Show More
12m 8s
Mar 19
The Horse Bus
Blaise Pascal created the first organised public transport system: the carrosses à cinq sols (“five-sou carriages”), which had its first full day of service in Paris on 19th March, 1662. Like a modern bus, the horse-drawn carriages followed fixed routes and scheduled departures, ... Show More
12m 13s
Recommended Episodes
Feb 2024
Hobo to Hero: A World War II Bomber Pilot's Saga
<p>Art Palmer is a child of the <a href="https://drought.unl.edu/dustbowl/" rel="nofollow">dust bowl</a> and self-admitted &#34;hobo&#34; who joined the U.S. Army Air Corps and piloted B-24 Liberators during World War II. Art&#39;s plane was shot down on his 50th mission and he s ... Show More
1h 24m
Jun 2022
The Unlikely Fate of the Wright Brothers
On a winter day in 1903, in the Outer Banks of North Carolina, the Wright Brothers changed history when they took the world's first engine-powered flight. It didn't take long for countries around the world to realise that the Wright flying machine had the potential to revolutioni ... Show More
26m 54s
Dec 2022
The Red Baron
The First World War saw many innovations in warfare. Probably the most significant was the introduction of aircraft.  The first military pilots didn’t really know what they were doing. There was no rulebook about how to fight with other aircraft. However, one pilot mastered the a ... Show More
12m 41s
Nov 2019
FPP061 - F-22 Raptor
<p>There may be no better fighter in history or currently flying than the <a href="https://www.lockheedmartin.com/en-us/products/f-22.html" rel="nofollow">Lockheed Martin F-22</a> Raptor. Designed as an air superiority fighter to replace the <a href="https://www.boeing.com/defens ... Show More
1h 36m
Jul 2021
FPP117 - C-17 Globemaster III
<p>Not every aircraft can be (or should be) an attention-grabbing 9G fighter or Mach 3 spy plane. Scores of unheralded support planes play vital military roles including the movement of critical supply. Without timely and sufficient beans, bullets, and bandages provided by cargo ... Show More
55m 31s
May 2019
FPP048 - Panavia Tornado
tail spinning
1h 9m
May 2024
L'antimilitarisme, une passion française [Le Fil de l'Epée #17]
<p>Invité : Eric Fournier, maître de conférences à l’université Panthéon-Sorbonne, co-directeur de "A bas l’armée. L’antimiliarisme en France du XIXe siècle à nos jours" (Editions de la Sorbonne, 2023)</p><br><p>Définition et balbutiements de l’antimilitarisme au XIXe siècle (1:3 ... Show More
1h 15m
Aug 2023
Gomorrah 1943 - Part 1
It was planned to be a war ending raid, with thousands of bombs dropped on Hamburg on the 2nd and 3rd August 1943. In the first of a two-part special on the firebombing, Al Murray and James Holland look at the history behind these indiscriminate bombing campaigns and the moral im ... Show More
48m 24s
May 2021
The Unabomber | 47
In the 1990s the FBI’s most wanted criminal was an elusive mystery bomber who had been mailing dangerous and deadly packages to executives and university professors since 1978. The UNABOMBER had left a trail of destruction around the United States, but the FBI had very little har ... Show More
48m 14s